The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1887-09-24
THE INFORMER'S FATE.
An Adventure with Pirates in the
Gulf of Alden.


/ have several times heard my father,
who was Lieutenant aboard of II. NJ.
S. Spitfire, tell of his adventures among
the pirates who used to make the coasts
of Arabia and Persia such a terror to
seamen. 1t took many years and plenty
of hard knocks to clear the seas of
those gentry, and the crews of the war
ships received more wounds than prize
money. One story in particular which
heard my father tell several times
over had a peculiar interest for me, for
l had seen the vessel spoken of in dock
at Liverpool. will give the yarn in
his own language as near as can:
S''We had run across from the Lacca-
dive Islands to the Gulf of Alden, and
were just inside the Island of Socotra
when we picked up sailor floating on
a plank. 1t was about seven o'clock in
the morning, with little or no sea run
ming, and the lookout saw him when he
was yet a mile away. How he was
preserved from the sharks has always
been matter of mystery to me.
When we lowered a boat to pick
him up he was fairly surrounded
by the hungry monsters. Through
the ships glass | counted nine
teen cutting the water around his
float, and l could not believe that the
boat would be able to reach him before
he was drawn down. If Providence
ever makes a special effort for poor hui
manity it made grand effort to pre-
serve that sailors life and permit him
to fulfill his mission. He was drawn
safely aboard the boat, and when he
had had a glass of grog we got his
story. He had been second mate on
board an American brig named the
True Flag. l think she hailed from
Boston, but am not sure. l saw her in
Liverpool three years before this incl
dent, and painted on her stern was the
first American flag had ever seen ex-
cept at distance. This was the rea-
son | remembered her above all others.
The American had been up the
Gulf and into the Red Sea, and had
come out with part of a cargo and was
going up to Mirbat to finish loading,
when he was attacked by three pirate
dhows. This occurred the evening be-
fore, and only twenty miles north of
the island. The attack was made after
shutdown, and while two other mer-
chantmen We're in sight. The dhows
had been noticed lowering about, and
their evil intention was suspected, but
it was little the crew of the brig could
do to defend themselves. They had a
few old muskets and cutlasses, but the
dhows ran the brig aboard, poured
fifty or sixty men on to her decks, and
the fight was over in five minutes. The
mate, knowing that all was lost, had
gone overheard with plank during
the confusion, and the wind and sea
had drifted him down across our course.
There was no doubt that every man
aboard the brig had been cut down or
saved for captivity and ransom, and
that the vessel had been thoroughly
plundered by that time, but it was Just
such an incident as we wanted to hear
of. We hadn't had brush with the
pirates for several weeks, and were get
ting rusty for the want of work.
1.-The Spitilre was, of course, a sail
ing ship. She was snug craft of
thirty-siX guns, with a strong and ready
crew, and the first thing done after
hearing the sailors story was to heave
her to in the light wind and transform
her from a taught and trim man-of-war
into a merchantmen. had charge of
this work, and it was not the first time
we had made the change to deceive the
pirates. Inside of three hours the best
glass aboard of dhow could not have
told the Spitfire of the Royal Navy from
the Sarah Jane of New Bedford. And
then we beat up to the north for further
news concerning the brig. The wind
was light and battling, and when night
came we had seen nothing. just at
dark, however, French bark coming
out of Keshin reported seeing three
dhows and brig standing in for a bay
between Mirbat and the latter place-a
hiding place and rendezvous, as we had
previously been informed. We could
do nothing going in there in the night,
but we stood on till pretty well in to
the coast and then prepared to lay of
and on. After midnight we got stiff
ish land breeze and had to run to sea,
and it was well that this happened so.
When morning came we could just
make out the coast range or mountains
through the glass, and the breeze was
dead against US. 1t was only well into
daylight when the dhows were espied
coming cat. We set signal of distress